Paul Vallas, the Democratic candidate for lieutenant governor, said in Springfield Tuesday that Republican governor candidate Bruce Rauner had businesses that exported jobs overseas, and he renewed criticism of Rauner investments in the Cayman Islands.

Rauner said in Springfield later Tuesday that both issues are being promoted by Gov. Pat Quinn and his allies “to create distractions from his horrible track record.”

“He has led to the deterioration of the business climate in Illinois,” Rauner said of Quinn, “and that's why we're suffering so badly.”

Rauner said many quality companies have overseas operations, and that investment firms — and Illinois pension funds, including the one from which Quinn will benefit — have investments in the Caymans.

Vallas, speaking to reporters near the Lincoln statue on the east side of the Statehouse, talked of Rauner firms involved in overseas jobs including one called Zenta.

The Quinn-Vallas campaign provided information showing that Rauner's former investment firm, GTCR Golden Rauner, formed a company called H-Cube in 2005, and it acquired a majority stake in Zenta in 2005. An announcement on PR Newswire said H-Cube was formed through a partnership between Henry Hortenstine and GTCR Golden Rauner “to create a world-class business process outsourcing company.”

H-Cube later acquired Global Realty Outsourcing Inc. and Blackheath Financial Inc, all of which specialized in things including business process outsourcing. H-Cube integrated the operations of the companies in 2007 and changed its name to Zenta.

Vallas said it is hard for Rauner to say he'll be a job creator when he has been “just the opposite.”

“Their business was showing their investors in other companies how to outsource,” Vallas said. “To argue that you're going to be a job creator when you've been just the opposite, and when you've literally created a conglomerate that is in the business of exporting jobs … there's just something fundamentally wrong about that.”

Rauner, appearing later at the Hoogland Center for the Arts to ask for quick court action to get a legislative term-limits proposal on the Nov. 4 ballot, said when asked about Zenta that many successful firms are multinational.

“I have never closed a plant and moved jobs overseas or that sort of thing,” Rauner said. “That's not what my business was.”

Page 2 of 2 - “Here's the issue,” he added. “Illinois competes in an international economy. America competes in an international economy. We need to grow and we need to be competitive. Many companies have international operations, overseas operations. They need to be effective and compete and have effective costs and productivity.”

He said some of the “most respected companies in the world,” including Apple and Nike, have operations in the U.S. and on other continents.

“That's part of our economy,” Rauner said. “The critical thing is, rather than criticize companies that might have operations on another continent … and say, well, all their jobs should be in America, no, not every job should be in America. What we need is companies thriving and investing and growing, and especially growing in the United States, and to grow in the United States, they often need to have effective operations also on other continents.”

Rauner said Illinois is not competitive for business, and has “punishing” regulations.

“We can't grow our economy, we can't create jobs for Americans and for Illinois families unless we change that and we're pro-business and pro-growth,” Rauner added. He said Quinn and his policies have been “outsourcers of jobs,” with “jobs leaving Illinois.” Rauner said Illinois has lost 4,200 jobs this year.

Vallas said the Rauner campaign is cherry-picking statistics. Vallas noted that the state's unemployment rate was 6.8 percent in July, down from 9.2 percent a year earlier.

“I think Illinois is coming back, but we have a long way to go,” Vallas said.

He also renewed his campaign's request that Rauner release schedules along with his tax returns to shed light on financial matters including investments in the Cayman Islands. The Chicago Sun-Times reported in Tuesday editions that Chicago-based GTCR established a dozen investment funds in the Caymans between June 2009 and July 2011, when Rauner chaired the firm. The newspaper reported that three of those funds are ones in which Rauner has declared a personal financial stake.

Rauner reiterated Tuesday that his tax rate is the same as Quinn's. He has said his former company's investments in the Caymans did not affect that rate.

Rauner also repeated that he has released “far more” tax information than is required by law.